1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a technique in which an image is formed by applying reaction liquid onto a recording medium then applying ink, which includes color material that is coagulated using the reaction liquid, onto the recording medium.
2. Related Art
A recording apparatus (image forming apparatus) in JP-A-2015-116797 discharges reaction liquid, in which color material included in ink is coagulated, onto a recording medium and then discharges ink onto the recording medium. The printing apparatus is able to coagulate color material of ink that is discharged onto the recording medium using the reaction liquid and quickly fix the color material of ink onto the recording medium.
Note that, in such an image forming apparatus, an amount of the reaction liquid that is applied to the recording medium is important. That is, when the reaction liquid on the recording medium front surface is too little, bleeding may occur in the image without reaction sufficiently occurring. Conversely, when the reaction liquid is too great on the recording medium front surface, blurring may occur on the image without a liquid droplet of ink sufficiently spreading out by a film of the reaction liquid being generated around the liquid droplet of ink that is landed on the recording medium. Alternatively, ink that is positioned at an end may be pulled to the center and an indentation may be generated on an end of the image due to convection that occurs by a process in which excess moisture evaporates.
Therefore, an amount of the reaction liquid that remains on a front surface of the recording medium when ink is applied to the recording medium greatly influences quality of the image. However, since infiltration is different according to the recording medium, in a recording medium with high infiltration, the reaction liquid does not sufficiently remain on the front surface of the recording medium, and in contrast, in the recording medium with low infiltration, the reaction liquid excessively remains on the front surface of the recording medium. As a result, it may be difficult to form an image with favorable quality.